August 2014

August 2014

WELCOME

This month’s cover represents quite a departure for Mix, and it’s pretty striking. Half a face, black and white, no console or room. One person. One profile. We are not trying to be Esquire or Men’s Health, or change our mission, and next month there will be a big Harrison console in a big room at Sony Pictures Studios. But there are a few reasons we did what we did on this cover....

ON THE COVER

There are people who know Chris Pelonis the Musician, and he is a monster guitar player. Others know him as Chris the Engineer/Producer or Chris the Singer-Songwriter. Closer to home, he might be known as Chris the Martial Arts Guy, Chris the Surfer, Chris of Chris & Pits BBQ or Chris the Choir Director. Lately it’s been Chris the Photographer. In our industry, he is known as Chris the Studio Designer or Chris the Speaker Maker. ...

When producer Joe Chiccarelli describes the Morrissey album he produced last winter as “musical theater,” he doesn’t mean it in the Showboat way. It’s a record full of original stories, with dramatic productions that frame the iconic artist’s creations in theatrical settings. ...

COLUMNS

As an engineer, educator, content creator and communicator, I’m constantly wrestling with tech upgrades. But the first question I have to always ask myself is: Will a software/hardware upgrade make me better at what I do?...

REGIONAL: CANADA

With nearly eight decades of experience between the two of them—including seminal projects for Rage Against the Machine, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Metallica, Van Halen, Aerosmith, AC/DC, and Biffy Clyro, as well as a number of Juno Awards—Garth “GGGarth” Richardson and Mike “The Fraze” Fraser are two of Canada’s finest, most well-respected producer/engineers....

LIVE

Multi-Platinum selling singer/songwriter Gavin DeGraw is in the middle of a hectic summer touring schedule, co-headlining with singer/songwriter Matt Nathanson in across the U.S. before heading to Europe in September. DeGraw is touring behind his fifth studio album, Make a Move, released last fall on RCA....

MUSIC

Like a lot of people, my first exposure to the duo known as First Aid Kit—Swedish sisters Klara and Johanna Söderberg—came from seeing their gorgeous 2008 YouTube cover version of Fleet Foxes’ “Tiger Mountain Peasant Song.”...

Every once in a while a song comes totally out of left field, far away from the mainstream, and for some inexplicable reason becomes a huge hit. One such tune was the 1985 Top 10 smash “Life in a Northern Town,” by an unknown new English band called Dream Academy....

Richard Thompson’s latest album, Acoustic Classics, is an unexpected gift to his many devoted fans—solo acoustic versions of 14 of his finest songs, spanning his work with ex-wife Linda (six songs), to his productive years with producer Mitchell Froom, and beyond. ...

Engineer/producer Ben Greenberg says he enjoys working in “proper studios,” but he’s equally fond of the way he recorded alt-rock band Heaven’s Jail earlier this year: They rented a house in upstate New York, where Greenberg set up his mobile rig, and they all camped out and tracked music for a week. ...

Producer Milo Froideval spent a month in Detroit, working on pre-production with Jessica Hernandez & The Deltas before bringing the band to residential Sonic Ranch Studios (El Paso, Texas) to make their new album, Secret Evil....

As I write this, the MacManus Brothers are playing onstage at Kew Gardens, London, opening for their brother, Elvis Costello, and fans who scored tickets to see Costello solo are lucky and then some. ...

One of the all-too-true clichés of the music and entertainment industry is that it is riddled with temptation. Drug use, alcohol consumption and countless other types of behaviors can very easily, and often very quickly, steer a life right off the rails. Some get sober, some don’t. Some are able to manage change, and some continue to struggle. It’s the rare individuals who go on to devote the rest of their lives to giving something back....

Genelec speakers, manufactured since 1978, are as common today in professional recording environments as the venerable Yamaha NS-10s were in the 1980s. Various models have become staples for recording, editing and mixing, but for some budgets these transducers are just out of reach. By introducing the M-Series (M030 and M040), Finland-based Genelec brings a more-affordable design to project studio owners....

LaChapell Audio is a Nashville-based company comprising designer Scott LaChapell and his father, a retired senior design engineer at Lawrence Livermore Labs who brings the electronics expertise. The 983S reviewed here is their fifth product and is based on the company’s 583, a 500 Series preamp module. LaChapell takes a no-compromise approach to design, fit and finish, and it shows in the 983S, which I was able to use across a range of sessions and inputs....